Cain Abel was a new name. A name the man who'd adopted it was still growing into. He was still in the process of defining what that name meant, what it stood for, what constituted the whole that was to be 'Cain Abel'.
In this current moment, the name Cain Abel was the name of a man who was on a path for some sweet, sweet vengeance.
"No bastard gets to burn my way off this archipelago and gets away unscathed," Abel swore, his foot tapping rhythmically and flipping his appropriated knife in his hand. The little actions were what halted his unyielding rage from carrying him along their wild, tumultuous waves.
If Cain Abel was to let loose all that emotion, he'd decided it would be done methodically as he tore the bitch who'd done this apart. Piece. By. Piece! Until not even One remained untouched!
…
'Huh, that thought felt... weirdly personal,' the man mused, distracted by the strange feeling for only a moment before it was time to focus on the business at hand.
"Did you find it yet?" Abel asked, barely keeping a lid on his impatience.
Tigre, in her true Tiger Form, sniffed around the entrance to the cave holding the wreckage of the man's former vessel. There was still a whiff of burning and smoke in the air, so the attack on his god damn property was fairly recent. Which meant that there should still be a trail fresh enough to track.
And after a few more moments, the tiger turned to look at Abel with a somewhat hesitant nod. Her animal instincts could sense what roiled just beneath the surface. And that made her wary.
"Good." With that simple statement Abel ceased his controlled fidgeting, stowed the knife, and climbed onto the tiger's back. "Follow it! Find them!"
With only a moments hesitation Tigre began to follow the tracks, carrying Abel along. Leaving the man with some time to think.
Despite the intensity of his rancor this very moment, that did not mean his mental faculties were dulled by any means. In fact, his mind felt strangely clear. A focused type of clarity. So he started asking himself some pressing questions.
'Why burn my ship?' Abel asked the first one, and the answer came to him. 'I did kind of get their partner killed. Revenge, then. They have their own vessel, without a doubt. Burn mine down, and I'm left with only two options: Build a raft, or take theirs instead. And only one of those is immediately available, and weirdly less risky.'
Abel cursed under his breath. "Shit!" 'She's trying to narrow down my options.'
Which meant that there was zero chance this wasn't some form of trap. Wonderful!
'Nothing to it,' Abel thought. 'A trap sprung is better than one lying in wait. Or so I think the saying goes. Besides, this is preferable. She could just escape instead, leaving me stranded. At least this way I'll find her!'
The wonders of human feelings. They could lead you to such illogical ends. Better for him, worse for the Baroque Works agent. What was her name again? Right, it was in his notes! Ms. Tuesday!
Tuesday was a good day for a funeral. The sea was as good a grave as any.
...Okay, maybe his mental state was veering a bit to the darker side of the tracks than necessary. It wasn't even that he had emotional investment in the god damn ship! It was just the principle of the matter! Someone fucked with his things, so he'd make them regret it!
Cain Abel, as he himself started to realize, was more than a bit ruthless. And vindictive. Overall pretty minor character flaws, if he was asked.
His emotional state aside, Abel doubted this was going to be much of a fight. He had a Rakshasa Tiger on his side and even as a cub one of those was a powerhouse, and that was without even adding a Devil Fruit into the equation. And while lacking in physical strength he refused to believe he'd go down like a chump either!
Tigre stopped for a moment, sniffing the ground, before her ears perked. The scent was stronger, nearby! With a roar she bounded towards her goal with greater speed.
It did not take long for Abel to be able to see what he assumed to be the Baroque Works ship through the trees, rapidly closing in. It was small, easy to navigate with one or two people and good enough to travel long distances. Not great, but he didn't need great to leave this place.
'And the mouse sees the cheese,' Abel mentally noted, his body bracing for action. He shifted, crouch-standing on Tigre's back. Ready to leap in any which way necessary. 'What's the plan here? Where's the trap? Let me see your move, you cretin wench!'
On que, the trap was sprung. The ground beneath Tigre collapsed, the tiger caught unawares and falling into the hole. Simultaneously three things happened: Abel used Tigre's back as a platform to leap forward; a weighted metal net above the pit trap fell over the large tiger; a figure hidden in the trees leapt down and landed in on top of the tiger.
Abel himself rolled on the ground and pivoted his body around with his hand grasping the ground, bringing himself to a stop in crouch his trapped companion, and the woman crouched above the tiger's body.
Tigre, momentarily stunned due to eating dirt all of a sudden, wasted valuable moments recovering. And when she did, her immediate animalistic reaction to being entrapped was to struggle and writhe, trying to shake off what bound her down.
Except Abel, in the role of an Observer, could note that something was wrong. Tigre's movements started frantic and erratic, as you might expect. Panicked and lacking precise intent. But rapidly, that struggle waned and slowed, until the tiger seemed to fall into a sort of daze.
"... Oh crap," Abel could only summarize, as the woman on top of the trapped tiger rose to her feet. In one hand she held a long katana-style sword. In the other, a syringe empty of its content. A syringe Abel recognized, as they used to belong to his previous self. '…Oh... CRAP!'
"Took you long enough, you craven bastard," the woman spoke coldly, stepping off the tiger's body without a care and glaring daggers at the feminine man. The beast barely even noticed as the potent sedative worked its magic. "Time to show why trying to play Baroque Works for fools is the last mistake you'll ever make..."
The two stared each other down for a moment, before Tuesday quirked a brow.
"I thought you had purple hair," The woman remarked. "And were a woman."
"I represent as a lot of things," Abel snarked almost on reflex.
"A deceiver from the start, then," the woman stated, spite clear in her tone.
As Ms. Tuesday raised her blade and entered a stance, Abel was just a mite distracted by something that, admittedly, was wildly inappropriate for the severity of the situation.
The woman was wearing short-sleeved shirt with a scarf and long pants. That was fine. Minimalist, but not bad. But what truly caught Abel's eye was the animal(?) hood with with three antenna stalks coming out of it. It was also a truly garish shade of yellow.
So naturally, in a situation where his life was on the line, Abel had one burning question that was totally worth asking.
"Excuse the non sequitur, " Abel slowly started, only to rapidly build up in intensity, "but what the fuck are you wearing?!"
X~ = = = = = = = = = = = ~X
⸶Imagine Dreamers!⸷
...
Episode 3
Confrontation in the Jungle! Cain Abel's Rising!
X~ = = = = = = = = = = = ~X
"...What?" Ms. Tuesday asked, momentarily baffled by such an out of nowhere swerve.
"Good lord, and I thought your dumbass partner had bad taste! Tacky it may have been, but at least he had some cohesion!" Abel palmed the ground in passing as he stood up and, for the lack of a better term, 'went off'. "Who the fuck thinks bright-ass yellow is a good color to add to an outfit?! It's not even a good complementary color, much less something you just throw in! Are you trying to make your enemies go blind? What, is having shit taste in fashion a requirement to join Baroque Works or something?"
"...Excuse me?" Ms. Tuesday's befuddlement only increased because this was very much not how she'd expected this to go. Also, she was getting very offended. "There's nothing wrong with my hood!"
"There's literally everything wrong with it!" Abel insisted, one hand raised in a fist while the other subtly moved behind his back. "The shape ruins the silhouette and makes it look ridiculous, the color clashes horrendously with the rest of the outfit, and I can't even tell what the fuck that thing supposed to be, and worst of all there isn't even any discernibly cohesive theme!"
It was so easy to be angry about this honestly nothing thing. Fashion, it seemed, was one of his passions. Abel approved his own taste, even if looking at this woman's garb made him want to vomit while violently killing someone.
Ms. Tuesday glowered darkly. "I'll take great pleasure in killing you..."
"Tch," Abel scoffed, lowering his fist to glower right back. "I'll be glad that after this there will be two less crimes against fashion in this world..."
That remark struck a nerve as Ms. Tuesday rushed at him, intent to separate his mouthy head from his body. The only thing Abel could think as he watched the blade slice through the air in near slow-motion was: 'Just as planned!'
Step 1: Get the enemy angry. Check! The fact he got to rant at her horrible fashion choices was a nice bonus. He'd also managed to hide two vital actions for his opening under the pretense of being annoyed by clothing.
Being petty was an incredible cover.
Abel leapt back slightly and leaned backwards just enough to let the blade pass his neck harmlessly and swung his clenched fist as he released the dirt he'd scooped off the ground right at Ms. Tuesday's face.
"Gah-hack!" The woman cried out and coughed as she was caught unawares and some dirt got into her eyes and mouth. Her hands gripped the blade and turned it around to swing at him again, even if doing so somewhat blindly.
Abel dodged under the blade and in passing used the dagger he'd prepared and his keen observations to cut her main sword arm in three places in a single fluid motion.
There were no wasted cuts.
Step 2: Create an opening and weaken the enemy on your first action! Already the man could see a difference in how the Baroque Works agent held her blade. Ms. Tuesday's dominant grip was not as firm due to the specific muscle groups he damaged, and her technique would suffer for it.
Abel leaped back, gaining considerable distance in a single bound, almost floating through the air and landing with only the slightest disturbance of the ground beneath his feet. That's how graceful his motion was, like a trained dancer in low gravity!
'My body is unusually light,' Abel recalled his bodily quirk. 'I can move more in a single bound than she could in a number of steps. By carefully controlling my footwork, I can control the flow of battle!'
In theory, reminded a quieter part that he ignored. Doubt lead to indecision, which lead to defeat. And Abel did not intend to lose!
"Grah! You rat!" Ms. Tuesday spat out, literally, wiping the dirt out of her eyes and glaring murder at the man in the tattered black dress. "You'll pay for that!"
"Bold words from a snake!" Abel shot back, flipping the knife into a reverse grip and taking a defensive stance. "... I assume."
He still had no clue what that hood was supposed to resemble.
Abel's eyes focused on his foe. He made light of things, but internally his mind was sharp as a razor. 'The first move is in my favor, but there's no guarantee I can beat her. '
That's why losing Tigre this early was in his mind a disaster. With her pacified he had no recourse but to rely on his own instincts. At least his body recalled what it was like to fight. But would if be enough?
Cain Abel could not count on that alone.
Ms. Tuesday rushed forward and swung her blade to kill. Abel blocked or diverted them with his knife. Even while fending off the attack with clashes of metal against metal, already his mind spotted a problem.
'In terms of weapons, I'm at a disadvantage. A sword has more reach, and she can put more momentum and power into her attacks. A knife is maneuverable, but I can't get close enough without stepping into her space, which she can exploit,' his mind analyzed as he used the flat of the knife to shove the blade aside, leaping back just as the blade returned to have another go at him. 'And despite the damage I did her skill with the blade is still enough to compensate fairly well for her weakened sword arm.'
Abel was forced onto the defensive, because an offensive response now that Tuesday was wise to his trickery would be ill advised. And he didn't exactly have the time to cook up a new scheme in the moment.
But that didn't mean that he was out of moves quite yet. He, specifically, had some options only he could pursue... in theory. 'God, I hope this will be worth it...'
The two adversaries dance of steel continued, Ms. Tuesday advancing with her relentless offense and Abel dancing circles around her with his near impeccable defensive strategy. But eventually one of them had to break the stalemate somehow.
Finally, Abel stumbled right as he blocked another swing, giving Tuesday an opening. "This battle is mine!" she proclaimed as she stabbed her sword right through the man's torso. Ms. Tursday grinned viciously.
Cain Abel grinned madly through the pain of being impaled. After all, he'd left that opening on purpose. "... Do you?"
His free arm shot out and grabbed onto the blade's handle and pulled the blade hilt deep, to the woman's surprise, as his other moved to stab her right through the bicep of her dominant arm. Tuesday shrieked in pain, trying to back away but Abel's hold on her blade made retreat tricky as the man moved pulled his knife back to stab her again.
Lacking much options, Ms. Tuesday was forced to let go of her sword to properly counter the stab, striking Abel's wrist in a manner that forced him to release the knife, which Tuesday grabbed out of the air as it fell.
*Creak...*
In that time Abel used the time to leap back once more, sword still hilt deep in his torso. "Gods, this is miserable," he wheezed, still grinning despite the agony as he grabbed the sword by the handle and painfully wrenched it out of his body. "Ghhh...Yeouch! Fuck me that stings!"
Just as with the claw marks Tigre gave him, there was no blood on his person or on the blade. Though he was quite cognizant of the thin role going all the way through his chest, at least it seemed like he wasn't about to drop dead from it.
Still... why did it feel like he just missed something fairly important?
"What...the hell are you?!" Ms Tuesday screamed out, already holding the knife in her more undamaged off-hand. "I stabbed you through the heart! I know I did!"
"Heh," Abel gave a short, contrite laugh through the lingering pain in his chest. "You did? Must've missed it."
She hadn't. Or at least Abel was almost sure she hadn't. His mind told him he should probably be rapidly dying, but another part of his mind had to finally come to terms with what he had suspected for a while now.
'My skin is damn near flawless and I heal unnaturally quickly. My body is unusually light and floaty. Prolonged contact with sea water makes me drowsy and lethargic. I'm now almost 90% sure I had literal cracks on my skin at one point, and now I was pierced through where my heart ought to be and am just in an appropriate amount of agony.'
Cain Abel, whoever he was, was by no metric a normal man. This he could no longer deny.
"Now, where was I?" the man of mystery asked, rhetorically of course, taking firm hold on the blade he now held. "Oh, right! To kill you for burning my fucking ship!"
Through the exchange in weaponry, the paradigm had shifted. Abel dashed in and utilized his superior mobility to force Tuesday on the defensive. He didn't simply attack her head on either. He dashed past her in attempts to flank her and danced circles around her to attack from unpredictable angles. But Tuesday put forward an admirable defense.
The longer the exchange went on, the more confident Abel became. He got some hits in, even if small ones. Moments where he slipped though her guard. A scratch here, a tiny cut there. None of them specific enough to be worth it on their own. But if he could keep this up... the belief that he could win rose to the surface of his mind from the depths of his ego.
And it is as they say.
'Pride comes before the fall.'
In a single moment the paradigm shifted yet again. Ms. Tuesday did something Abel hadn't expected of her. Her injured dominant hand, which the man had begun to neglect, surged forward with so far unprecedented swiftness and grabbed the hand that held the sword. Abel had nary the moment to blink as her off-hand swung the knife right at his wrist.
Abel, and probably Tuesday as well, expected the knife to cut deep, and for the crossdresser to be forced to relinquish the blade he stole.
Instead the metal knife struck Cain Abel's wrist, and his hand shattered off his arm as if it were made of glass.
"WHAT THE HELL?!" Ms. Tuesday swore in shock, unintentionally mirroring Abel's own internal exclamation as he used the opportunity to leap back as far as his legs could send him.
Abel landed with the grace of a dancer, though he stumbled as he stared at the stump where a hand used to be. What seemed like shards of translucent matter flaked off the jagged edges. It was less like seeing a grievous and more like a crystal that just had a piece broken off.
'Right then! Cracks on skin, now it makes sense- NOT! WHAT THE SHIT?!' Abel panicked internally, but worked his ass off to hide it from showing up externally. Focusing on the very legitimate pain of losing a hand helped, ironically enough.
There was exactly zero time for having an existential crisis in the middle of a fight. Especially since Abel was now down both a weapon and a gods damned hand!
"...A Devil Fruit user," Ms. Tuesday made her own conclusions, quickly retaking her sword as the dismembered hand fell to the ground and shattered like someone had dropped a glass globe on the floor.
'Cool theory,' Abel admitted, as on the surface it made a whole load of sense. There was just a massive glaring problem with it. 'Except that I went for a swim and didn't drown!'
Okay, fine, he did eventually get his energy drained, but the Devil Fruit's well documented weakness to the sea was as potent as it was absolute. No, it just could not be that simple, could it! But that was yet another a question for later.
'Now,' Abel refocused his mind and forced his attention away from his missing hand, 'how the hell do I come back from this?!'
Staying on the defensive was near self-destructive at this point. Without a weapon all he could rely on was his agility to dodge, which just would not cut it. And he really didn't want to get hit! Postulating from the hits he'd taken previously, it honestly didn't seem like it took that much to 'break' his body.
Which, one: was horrifying because he did not like being fragile. And two: it actually meant that he could 'eat' certain types of hits because it very much seemed that while his body was literally brittle, he could take fatal levels punishment to a degree that would normally murder him dead.
The steadily closing hole in his chest was evidence A. So he still had a shot at this. Now if only he had could get a weapon again, he'd be golden!
But... defeating Ms. Tuesday wasn't necessarily his win condition, was it?
A rough idea- because under no circumstances could it count as a 'plan' -formed in Abel's mind. Now he had to focus his effort on one thing alone. A thing he thought he was very good at.
Survival!
Still, what a tall order that was, Abel couldn't help but think-
"Die!"
'Oh shit-' Abel ducked low under the attack and dove past Tuesday with a floaty leap, before repeating the process, moving around the woman via a series of fast, short leaps. 'Can't get distracted! I still have superior mobility, use that!'
Abel anticipated another strike and tensed his legs in preparation. When Tuesday swung at him, Abel leaped over it and, for just a moment, landed on Tuesday's outstretched arm. In that moment Abel- balancing on the tip of his boot -twisted his body in a single full rotation, letting the momentum focus on his other leg, landing a pirouette kick on Tuesday's face.
*Cri-ick*
The woman let out a yelp, but Abel could tell that any damage done was negligible at best, though it did stun her for a valuable second. In that second Abel leapt again, landing behind Ms. Tuesday, with a split second to act.
But what would do him any good? Skill and technique be damned, his unarmed strikes were simply too weak! And alarmingly, Abel could have sworn he'd heard a faint cracking sound from his leg after that kick landed. 'Damage from just kicking her kinda hard?! That's not fair at all!'
Abel's eye drew to his hand, at the stump that remained, though to call it that wasn't exactly right. The quite 'unclean' break held some vaguely crystalline qualities and naturally was somewhat-
On an ungodly mix of a light bulb moment and a brain fart, just as Tuesday pivoted to slice at the man Abel ducked under it and rammed the end of his stump into her side.
"GAAAH!" Tuesday cried out in pain as the decidedly jagged stump pierced her side from multiple quite sharp points.
"HAAAA!" Abel let out a mix of a battle cry and a howl of agony as his stump shattered even further, breaking apart into splinters that lodged themselves into Tuesday's flesh, leaving him with less than half of his forearm intact.
Abel immediately leapt for distance, breathing quite heavily and gritting his teeth. "Holy... gods that smarts! Why am I so dumb?!"
Ms. Tuesday for her part stumbled back on her feet while clutching her heavily bleeding side, face twisted in blazing agony. Her eyes still glared viciously at the very damaged crossdresser though. "I'm... gonna kill you... so hard!"
"State something... less obvious, you fashionless crone!" Abel couldn't help but taunt her with a wicked grin. "Where I'm standing, I've hurt myself more than you have! Get good, casual!"
Internally, however: 'HOLY FUCKING OW! I AM NEVER, EVER DOING THAT AGAIN!'
Still, he couldn't deny that he'd done some severe damage with that last 'gambit'. Those shards of...he guessed 'him' in her body would serve to constrain her movements even more, lest she agitate the wounds she already had.
…
'Heh, inside her. I'm hilarious! Comedy!'
Pushing through the pain, Abel grit his teeth and tried to clear his head of the incredibly distracting warning signs of his body telling him to 'stop hurting yourself, idiot!', such as mental hysteria. Whatever the benefits were, that 'move' still wasn't, and never would be, worth it.
Speaking of how distracting the pain was, the haze of agony in Abel's mind cleared just in time for Tuesday to be just on him, blade already singing through the air.
Perhaps it was because he was still partly in a sort of fugue state, or maybe his pain honed his pre-existing instincts, but in that moment Abel's mind drifted to when he held that same sword for a brief time. Its shape, its weight, how its grip felt in his hand. How the blade traveled through the air, causing a faint sound of displaced air...
On ingrained reflex stemming from deep within his being, Cain Abel swung his sword, deflecting the incoming blow aside with... wait... 'What...?'
Abel blinked, his mind suddenly whirring with activity, replaying the action in slow motion. His surviving hand swinging into his field of vision, a sword clutched in its grip. A familiar sword. An identical sword to the one it parried with the side of its blade.
The same sword which shattered mid-blade after that point of impact, as if it were made of glass. Just like... his hand had.
'...What the FUUU...'
NO! Hard stop to that! Now was the time for action!
Time resumed its normal pace, Ms. Tuesday was wide-eyed, just as caught off guard as the man who'd done it in the first place. "W-Was that my swo-"
Unlike her, the man's surprise lasted approximately a quarter of a second before he reigned it in!
Abel swung with the half-shattered blade, cutting into Tuesday's so far untouched arm, the sudden motion slackening her hold on the knife she'd taken, and in the same motion Abel twisted the pommel of the blade to knock it out of her hand.
Abel, for the briefest moment, cursed when it landed into the ocean not far from where they fought. He'd forgotten how close to the shore they were. But he had no time to gripe as the blade in his hand shattered to pieces in totality. 'Incredibly poor durability. Guess that adds up.'
"Crap!" Tuesday cursed, rearing back and raising her own sword with both of her wounded arms as Abel swung with his. And the Baroque Works agent got a proper look at how a brand new sword, identical to the one in her hands, formed out of a crystalline material right into the crossdresser's hand. The two swords clashed blades, the impact reverberating...
Then the imitation blade shattered into many shards, forcing Tuesday to close her eyes to avoid any shrapnel and step back. "Damn it!"
Abel's mind, meanwhile, was in 'The Zone' as it was called. Pain aside, for the first time since waking up with nothing his mind felt clear, focused, and honed to a fine point!
'I created a copy. A false image forged in crystalline,' the man's mind analyzed. 'It is a fake. It is brittle, and can break after a single decent hit. But...'
The blade shattered out of his grip and in his hand he formed another image. Tuesday narrowly opened her eyes and took a swing at him, but it was almost as if the dress-wearing man flickered in her vision, vanishing. "Wha-" A surge of pain made the woman grit her teeth as she almost stumbled when one of her legs nearly gave out from under her.
In that moment Abel had ducked low beneath her field of vision incredibly quickly and then dashed right past her as fast as he could while staying low to the ground, passing her by in a single leap while using his false knife to cut into her thigh muscle.
'A fake, a false image or not,' the man's thought concluded, 'a blade remains a blade!'
"Imagine: Knife," Abel intoned, sliding into a turn, keeping low to the ground, the knife in his hand shattering to pieces, "Hamstring Pass!"
A part of Cain Abel's being sang. This, right here, felt like something that was undeniably him in all aspects!
"You weasely shit!" Ms. Tuesday cursed at him, altering her stance to accommodate her injured leg, and charged at him again, though visibly slower with all her injuries accumulating.
"Imagine: Sword!" Abel conjured forth another copy of the sword into his hand, pushing hard with his feet to rush at the woman in turn. Their blades clashed, Tuesday's pushed and Abel's breaking, but the man was already prepared to create another weapon. "Imagine-"
*Cra-ack*
Abel's eyes widened as his almost trance-like focus was disrupted. 'Huh? What was...?'
The next moment, the instant Abel's leg touched the ground again in preparation for his next attack... it shattered away right from under him.
'...HUH?! Wait, why did-' A recollection, from not too long ago. A faint crack from that specific limb, no issue at that moment, but, '...That was the leg I kicked with, wasn't it?'
And then the pain hit him like a sea train right to the face and he got jettisoned out of 'The Zone' like a missile. Followed by a swift kick in his actual face from Tuesday, which Abel could now feel form cracks on his pristine features. Followed by crashing into the ground on his back, which was by itself followed by the sharp point of a sword impaling him squarely through the middle of his throat.
All in all, an incredibly agonizing chain of very rapid events. Even as Abel tried to form a knife in his hand, nothing happened. 'Ghh... I can't form a solid image in my head... pain too distracting... god this is hell!'
"Finally nailed you down, you bastard!" Ms Tuesday spat, breathing heavily due to all her injuries as well as general fatigue.
"Pun... intended?" Abel slowly croaked while grimacing in a way where he tried to make being in pain look suave while proving that he, indeed, either didn't have proper vocal chords or didn't need them to talk smack.
"God, you never shut up, do you," Tuesday griped before shrugging her shoulders before roughly planting her foot on his chest cavity, which made a creaking sound and forcing a reactionary spasm from the crossdresser while she grimly loomed over his body. "Well, no matter! You're done. And after what you did to my partner, I'll make sure you'll spend every single one of your last moments praying you'd be as dead as you ought to be!"
Instead of showing fear, Abel simply grinned defiantly as he let out a chuckle, though it came out more like a pained wheeze. "Kehehe... oh, so you...still haven't figured it out?" Abel needled her. "The tiger-"
"That beast ain't coming to save you from what I'm about to do," Tuesday stated darkly. To which the man just laughed again.
"Kehehe! No," he coughed, "no, no. It's just funny... that you missed something so... obvious."
"The hell are you on about now?" Tuesday spat at him. "Pain make you delirious already? If so, just you wait, because the first thing I'll do is-"
"You used one of... my sedatives. Well, kehehe, here's the thing," Abel cut her off, weakly raising his arm with the index finger pointed up in a lecturing manner. Tuesday lifted her foot and stomped down on his wrist, shattering that hand too off his arm. "Thaaaat," the man hissed, pushing through the pain, "used to work. But, see... the thing about youth is, we're... malleable, you get me?
"See, I didn't break that beast out of that cage" Abel told his tormentor and enemy with a malicious grin slowly climbing on his lips. "Didn't need to. It's a wonder what... you can adapt to after a while. And also," his smile turned almost conspiratorial, "you forgot one big thing."
"You shut your god damn mouth, or I'll start by break your ja-!" Ms. Tuesday almost leapt out of her skin, if she wasn't tightly held in place by a large hand suddenly gripping her by her torso and lifting her up, and in the process dislodging the sword from Abel's throat to a sliver of relief for the man in agony.
Cain Abel just grinned wickedly at her. "What's the benefit of Zoan Devil Fruits again? Right: Increased physical resilience!"
Tigre, towering over the two human in her Hybrid Form, fur and mane of hair bristled and giving her an even more feral appearance, growled at Ms. Tuesday while glaring at the woman with a single-minded fury before raising her arm and preparing to throw-
Abel briefly wondered, 'Hold on, does she seem bigger than last time?' before his eyes traced the tiger's rough aim trajectory. Immediate panic ensued. "Wait WAIT, DON'T-"
-Ms Tuesday was thrown with a full display of the Zoan User's strength directly at the wooden ship anchored to the shore. Tuesday's body impacted the wooden side of the small ship like a cannonball so hard that her form broke through the material composing the railing, bounced off of the deck and sent her battered body spinning a good distance past the vessel before her form crashed into the ocean.
Abel didn't care a whit for any of that. All he cared for was that there was now a sizable crack, just big enough to let water into the ship's hull.
"Fuck, fuck, fuck!" Abel shifted to get up, only to be harshly met with the ground as he was reminded that not only was he in agonizing pain but that he currently had two shattered arms and only a single intact leg. "Hey! Hey, Tigre!"
The towering part-human Rakshasa Tiger turned to look down at his broken form with this sort of glazed, dim look in her eyes.
"Yes, you! Quick!" Abel hurried, his urgency ignoring how much he wanted to pass out right now because everything hurt. "Grab that ship, the wooden thing in the water! Pull it so it's partially on the ground! Hurry!"
If that ship sunk, Abel was well and truly out of options, because there was no salvaging that with what he had available.
Tigre's towering form blinked dumbly at him, even more so than usual at that, before her body move closer to the shore and, with her proportionally long limbs, grabbed onto the wooden bow of the small ship and heaved its creaking bulk somewhat lopsidedly onto the shore with relative ease.
Abel cringed because Tigre's clawed hands caused even more damage to the ship because the tiger clearly didn't have good control of her own strength, even if it was minor by comparison. But at least the ship was now beached, even if it rested at an angle where the stern was almost submerged. At least the water couldn't get in through the crack in the hull.
Still, that was enough for him to sigh in relief and flop face first onto the ground. Then, and only then, did he allow himself to just groan there, expressing his miserable state in as understated manner as he could manage.
He was down both hands and one leg. He had cracks all over his beautiful face, a hole in his throat, and one going through his chest, which had decently filled in at this point. So Abel was fairly confident he would heal, slowly, from even what would be life ending damage to his being. Probably would even regrow his limbs, eventually, if this trend of mind boggling bullshit continued!
Miraculous or not; still not worth all the agony. The pain wasn't even fading! It just lingered, like a splinter wedged beneath his skin, which was infinitely worse!
"Wargh?" Abel felt something poke at his side, so with great displeasure he forced his head to roll to its side so he could open one eye and glare at Tigre, who was now in Human Form and crouched on all fours(blessedly the cloak/shawl/thing served its purpose so he didn't need to stare at things he really didn't care to) beside the man and staring down at him quizzically and prodding at him. "Raugh! Raah?"
Abel stared at what was essentially a kid poking at his carcass with a stick with all the non-existent vitriol he just could not produce at the moment, before burying his face into the ground once more.
Then he started muttering all the muffled curses- real and 'creative' -his mind could conjure into the dirt and pretended it made him feel better.
...
...At least he won!
...
That did not make him feel better either.
X~ = = = = = = = = = = = ~X
-Author's Notes-
"I am the bone of my sword,"
"Brittle is my body, and pain is in my blood,"
"I have created a whole lot of things, but they always break on me..."
"Don't know who I was, nor what I am,"
"And so I cry,"
"Limited Thing Works(?)"
...Yeah, I'd say Abel's version sucks harder. Have this off-brand tin star with the words 'Bargain Bin Emiya' written in crayon!
Right! I think I got this chapter squared up... hopefully. Sometimes you need to just accept that some mistakes you just won't catch because creator blindness is a hell of an inconvenience.
Our...hero(debatable) finally learns what about him is so special, so now most of those cards are on the table(aside from a fairly minor detail)! Just ignore that pile of all the questions that we don't have answers yet, m'kay.
Next chapter will DEFINITELY be a short one closing out this little intro arc. And then we can move onward to the unknown with some pseudo-original content! And who knows?
Maybe we'll meet some friends along the way?